Various mechanisms may be employed to guide mobile platforms. For example, in a commercial aircraft application, a nose wheel is generally employed to steer the aircraft upon landing. The nose wheel is most typically mechanically coupled to a nose gear. Generally, the nose gear is in turn coupled to a steering mechanism, such as a tiller, in the cockpit for receipt of an input from a pilot. Thus, as the input from the pilot is transferred to the nose gear from the tiller, the nose gear serves to move the nose wheel to guide the aircraft based on the input.
Generally, most tillers have at least a small degree of backlash which provides undesirable feedback to pilots while steering. This can cause the vehicle to drift off course or provide numerous small inputs to the steering system which can prematurely wear out the system. Accordingly, it is desirable to provide a steering tiller that substantially or completely eliminates the backlash in the steering tiller.